


not waving but drowning

by apocryphic



Category: Dishonored (Video Game)
Genre: Angsty Camaraderie, Canon Typical Violence, Drowning, Gen, Low Chaos (Dishonored), Mention of character death but not permanent, Post-Game, Suicide Idealization
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-13
Updated: 2014-06-13
Packaged: 2018-02-04 12:02:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,977
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1778341
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/apocryphic/pseuds/apocryphic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Many times, he drowns. Many times, that one is on his shoulders to bear, because... because he chooses it, frequently. There is something poetic in it, and all things considered, it is a fairly peaceful way to go. He finds he likes it more than electrocution, or being blown up, or having those rats of his climb through tattered clothes and devour him as he stays stoically silent, only hissing breaths in between teeth that clench to hold the blood behind his teeth. He never chooses the rats.</p>
            </blockquote>





	not waving but drowning

Corvo has died in dreams.

More than once and occasionally over and over until whatever lesson is attempting to be seen makes itself known; the Void claims who it likes, when it likes, as it likes. The Void is unfeeling and apathetic — yet somehow, in a cruel way, sentimental. Corvo has found himself falling, shot, stabbed, bleeding, choking, electrocuted, burned to death, eaten alive —

Corvo has _often_ died in dreams.

Many times, he drowns. Many times, that one is on his shoulders to bear, because... because he chooses it, frequently. There is something poetic in it, and all things considered, it is a fairly peaceful way to go. He finds he likes it more than electrocution, or being blown up, or having those rats of his climb through tattered clothes and devour him as he stays stoically silent, only hissing breaths in between teeth that clench to hold the blood behind his teeth. He never chooses the rats.

Sometimes he even hears laughter, sometimes he hears a sigh, but more than anything there is a breathy, pitying, "my dear," whispered by his ear, and he is put right back together again. After he's done dying, of course. It is less that he's died in dreams, then, and more that he's simply nearly died. That just doesn't sound right enough for him, however, and so he goes on keeping track of how many times he has practically died in dreams.

He is not a martyr; he is simply atoning, in some fashion or another.

When he is not practically dying in his dreams because, somehow, he attracted the attention of the black-eyed man that seeks out entertainment in all that he does, Corvo is always watching, and protecting, and watching some more.

(The Outsider is always watching, and waiting, and watching, so perhaps there is some sad parallel and sadder reasoning behind the deity's enthrallment with the Lord Protector.)

There is no excuse then for how Corvo comes up with a silly, fantastical, ridiculous, stupid whim of facing Daud again. Maybe the Outsider has gotten to him. Maybe the curls of shadow and strange gravity that gather around the not-god-not-devil suggested the thought to Corvo; maybe he's just grown tired of needless, useless, meaningless sacrifices in realms that play at reality but are so far from it.

Maybe Corvo wants sustenance.

In the end, he goes. He leaves Emily, because he is tired, and she is safe, and he is tired, and he goes. He disappears off to the Flooded District. He removes the gloves that he's worn since the end of the Loyalists and he allows the bright burn of the mark against his hand to flare; he is in one place one moment and the scaffolding the next, and Corvo reaches Daud's office, remembers their duel, and wishes, for once, that he could find it in him to shout abuse at the sky and have the Void strike him down for ever once thinking himself capable of defying its will.

The Chamber of Commerce is empty.

Corvo sits on the floor with crossed legs, takes in the nothing, and breathes without looking.

There is less plague in the air now that Piero and Sokolov are doing their best to rid the city of the nastiness. The Month of Clans is upon them, and it is not as cold as it has been. Little reason to not leave the Tower for... for respite. Emily is safe, Corvo tells himself. Emily is safe.

He had shown mercy to Daud, in that time that feels more ancient than the ruins that he knows lie under Dunwall. He had left the blade sheathed, he had wiped the blood clean. He had done a great many things with a heavy weight on his shoulders to keep Daud from dying at his hands, and Daud is gone, of course he is. Gone to wherever he wants, living freely, but shackled to his guilt. There is a small part of him that is glad, but mostly Corvo is weary.

He opens his eyes when he feels the presence of another in the broken, beaten room, and Daud says, "Reliving the past is a trying ordeal, Corvo."

"You said you wouldn't return," says Corvo. And he doesn't sound especially put off by the fact that Daud has gone against his own word; the only thing to find in his voice is relief and a bone-aching tiredness.

"Yes, well," Daud says, and Corvo doesn't miss the way he stays a careful distance from him, "I have a lacking memory."

"You don't lie as well as you tell the truth," Corvo says and stands up. The singing sound of his sword sliding out of the sheath is the loveliest sound he's heard in a long time, and as he holds his blade loosely, ready, Daud still doesn't move.

"No mercy this time?" Daud remarks like he is sorry, but not sorry he's here, and it sounds a lot like he's saying, _how the mighty fall terribly and take so many down with them_ ; Corvo tells him to draw his blade, and the way he says it has to give away just how desperate he is for some kind of release, some kind of distraction, because Daud does just that and meets him in the middle with a clash of metal.

It doesn't last long.

They're fighting, but Corvo isn't aiming to kill, as much as his heart stings with the desire; Daud is not aiming to kill, for his own selfish reasons, Corvo is sure. Daud has so many burdens on him of his own doing already — killing Corvo would add to them, and that is Daud's selfish reasoning behind not killing Corvo.

They do, each, in their own way, fight dirty, until Corvo is trying to disarm him with each slash and Daud very nearly trips him. Both are skilled fighters, and the powers bestowed upon them never once breach the surface. Neither mention this.

There is one beautiful sweep of Daud's blade, and Corvo's sword arcs gracefully through the air only to slide across the floor and then off the edge of the torn-apart building. There is one jarring moment where Corvo's back hits the wood and he coughs out a noise that _hurts_ and his head falls hard. There is one shared, conflicted meeting of their gazes, where Daud's blade pauses a hair's breadth from Corvo's throat, where Corvo doesn't know whether to see if Daud will continue and have mercy on Corvo this time around.

"You're sloppy," Daud accuses like that's the only thing to say.

Corvo feels a disgusting crawl up his spine, makes a _furious_ noise in his throat, and kicks.

Daud goes down to one knee from the angry force behind it and Corvo moves smoothly to his feet, gets hardly two feet before Daud is trying to get one over on him by kicking him in the stomach as a rebuttal. Corvo coughs, inhales and exhales the pain away.

Corvo takes one look back at Daud, when there's a pause too long.

Daud sees what he's about to do and reaches too late.

Corvo jumps too readily.

He lands in the water, why wouldn't he land in the water — while it wasn't too cold while he was dry, it's cold enough to take his breath away faster than anything Daud had done to him. His teeth already clench together to keep from letting them chatter, he's regretting leaving his gloves behind, and he dives for his sword before he's being wrenched up by his coat collar, before there is a voice hissing at him for being _careless_ , for being too _risky_ — 

Daud's dragged him to the side of the river, up onto some cracked stairs. Corvo's struggling, lashing out, not yelling, never yelling; he's completely, absolutely silent where Daud has his mouth against Corvo's ear — _Daud_ trying to talk sense into him, something is _very_ wrong here, and Corvo _laughs_ at the sheer absurdity of it.

Until Daud dunks his head under the river. And then he's choking on water in his lungs.

"You are better than this," Daud is saying, fierce and fast and harsh as he pulls Corvo up again, and Corvo is spitting water and whatever else out. Daud dunks him again. Corvo sucks more water in; dirty, nasty water down his throat and _in his lungs_ and oh, fuck, he's trying to cough without any air to cough out, just _half of the damned river._

Then there _is_ air, but it's not enough, and Daud is not even talking anymore. It's just a cruel litany of Corvo's wet hacking, liquid fire in his chest, fingers clenching tight on the stone, enough to make his palms and fingers bleed from the rock's surface. Just as Corvo is recovering enough to think, _what is going on_ , more than the alarm bells of, _I can't breathe_ , Daud's got both his hands in Corvo's hair, tighter than when it was just the one hand gripping him before, and he's shoving him under the surface of the water. Again.

There's something methodical to the way Daud almost counts the shuddering beats of Corvo's heart, and the more Corvo goes without properly breathing, the more limp he becomes, and the longer Daud holds him under. This time, it's long enough for Corvo's lungs to feel less like they're filled with water and gunk and more to feel like they're on _fire_ which is, logically, impossible.

Logically, Corvo shouldn't be here, and logically, Daud shouldn't be trying to torture him by slowly drowning him, Corvo had thought slightly better of him than that, even after everything.

These are perhaps the thoughts Corvo would be having, if not for...

Daud pulls his head up again and Corvo has the ability to, at least, realize it hurts his scalp, and he's sniffling and making a strangled hiccup of an attempt to breathe on instinct and Daud is just _sitting there_ next to him, only one hand back in Corvo's hair, staring at the Lord Protector like he's something that needs serious fixing.

Corvo retches, and coughs and chokes and can't breathe all over again, dirtying the water that realistically can't be dirtied further anyway.

"You," Daud says, anger like smoke rising slowly, "are _better_ than this, Corvo."

Corvo's too busy gasping and trying to keep down the rest of whatever's in his stomach. It doesn't work. He throws up again, and Daud is still holding his hair, and nothing makes sense. Nothing at all.

"You are _better than this_ ," Daud repeats.

"Hgh," Corvo says into his distorted reflection.

"I didn't come back here to watch you throw everything away. I didn't come back to see you _pine_ for the days when you weren't a force to be reckoned with."

Corvo has always been something dangerous.

But with a sick, uncomfortable lurch, Corvo thinks, _He's right_.

Before all of this, before he'd seen Daud drive his sword through Jessamine's heart, before Coldridge, before the Outsider and the Loyalists — Corvo had only _potential_. Corvo before had not been a one man army, set out to allay revenge and find redemption. Corvo before had not been hardened and angry at a great many things. Corvo had his anchors, before, and now —

He is adrift.

More water comes up his throat and he shuts his eyes tight and all but wheezes, dizzy and disoriented but he knows, he knows Daud is right, and now he knows why Daud is doing this.

He doesn't hate him any less for it.

Daud leaves, eventually. Leaves him with thoughts heavier than his body, lethargic and spent and soaked all over. Corvo's throat hurts, but it's nothing in comparison to the chill that doesn't come from the air around him.

When he sleeps next, he chooses the rats over the water.


End file.
